


Revelations (The Divided Remix)

by panisdead



Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: Community: remixredux06
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-02-19
Updated: 2011-02-19
Packaged: 2017-10-15 18:52:34
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,857
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/163845
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/panisdead/pseuds/panisdead
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Loyalty: faithfulness or devotion to a person or cause.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Revelations (The Divided Remix)

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Revelations](https://archiveofourown.org/works/32809) by [etben](https://archiveofourown.org/users/etben/pseuds/etben). 



> Thanks to Mz_bstone for beta, Mahoy for read-through and helpful commentary, and Rusty76 and Tinyfroglet for beta and endless discussion.

Ronon wakes to the sight of Teyla standing shadowed in his doorway. He is instantly alert, the hilt of his dagger smooth and warm in his hand under the bedclothes.

"I came to warn you," says Teyla, shifting her pack on her shoulder. "The time has come. I can protect you no longer."

Ronon says nothing. He has never truly been one of her tribe, never looked to her for protection. Even inside her he's only sought release.

"Dr. Weir believes the battle is almost upon us," says Teyla, and stops, hair obscuring her downturned face. When she raises her head, her eyes are fierce. "I will not lead my people into a hopeless war."

Ronon breathes in the scent of her, faint and elusive in the darkened room. "They'll find you," he says, remembering pale eyes in the forest at night, the sound of footsteps behind him.

"But I will not have given them my people," says Teyla, and turns away. Ronon watches her go, and sleeps no more that night.

When they fly to the camp on the mainland the next day they find it empty. Ronon crouches next to the charred remains of a cooking fire and thinks of Teyla in battle, in meditation, in bed. "We won't find them," he tells Sheppard, standing silently above him. "They won't fight without her anyway." He breathes in, searching for a scent he won't find, and his mouth tastes of ashes.

 

***********************  
Ronon wakes to Sheppard's voice over the comm link, dark and urgent. _"Fourth level down under Pier Six,"_ says Sheppard. _"Wear galoshes."_

The room where he finds Sheppard reeks of cave and mold, and the walls are slick with moisture. Sheppard's headlamp stabs through the blackness, making the ripples in the ankle-deep water glitter like broken glass. He straightens up from his crouch when Ronon appears, and his face is blank but Ronon can hear his teeth grinding.

There's no one else there. Ronon stares at Sheppard, at the water dripping like blood from the crowbar in his hand, and waits.

"The primary retention hatch," says Sheppard. He gestures sharply at the portal set into the floor at his feet, at the sickly gleam of metal hinges barely visible through the water. "I can't--I need to--" He's almost vibrating with energy. Ronon hears the bones in his knuckles creaking as he clenches them around the crowbar. "Elizabeth ordered us to wait, to find another way, but I know I can stop the leak if I can just get to the source."

Bubbles filter up through the seam around the hatch, bursting soundlessly at Sheppard's feet. There's at least one more level of machinery below them before open water. It must already be flooded. "Can't hold your breath forever," says Ronon, listening to the harsh sound of Sheppard panting in the darkness.

Sheppard stretches out a hand, fingertips just barely stroking the wall. A faint, shuddery light appears for the space of a heartbeat, then fades. "In another hour this entire level will be dead," says Sheppard. "I _have_ to." He thrusts the crowbar at Ronon. "Open the hatch."

After Sheppard is gone, Ronon holds his breath until the waves stop slapping against the walls, until the static from the comm link begins to hurt his ears. The third time he breaks and sucks air into his burning lungs, he knows.

Sheppard's headlamp is on the floor at his feet, light filtering through the sediment in the water in ghostly swirls. He reaches down and extinguishes it, then makes his way back through the bowels of the city in darkness.

 

*******************

Ronon wakes to nausea and the sting of bile in his throat. McKay, he thinks. McKay has tablets for stomach sickness, and he'll be awake.

The air near the laboratory tastes faintly metallic, bitter on the back of Ronon's tongue. The raised voices he hears from inside the room are bitter too. Ronon halts just outside the doorway, watching the pinched, angry line of McKay's mouth as he argues.

"Rodney, we _must_ try again," Zelenka implores, hands cupped as if in prayer. "There must be a solution somewhere, some aspect we have not considered--"

"And I am telling you that it can't be done!" shouts McKay, eyes frantic. "This isn't a question of looking further or working harder! I may be a miracle worker, but what she's asking me to do is not physically possible!" He seizes a carafe from the table and flings it to the floor in an explosion of glass and dark liquid. His chest heaves, and Ronon can almost taste the desperation rolling off him. "The shield protocols are set in stone--alter them and the entire city will light up like a beacon. What you are asking me for is a _death sentence_."

Zelenka moves forward and places a hand on McKay's arm, heedless of the mess on the floor. "We must try again," he says urgently. "Dr. Weir is adamant. She believes you will find a way if only you will try, for the good of the mission. She begged me to reason with you--"

"Well, now we see where your loyalties lie," McKay hisses furiously, jerking away from him. "As for mine, I refuse--I refuse to go down in history as the idiot--the _fool_ \--responsible for the deaths of the entire expedition. Elizabeth is _wrong,_ she's--I won't do it. Years of work, my entire lifetime's worth of progress destroyed--I won't. I can't." He turns away, arms crossed over his chest, hands clutching convulsively at his biceps.

Zelenka's face crumples. His hand hovers in the air, a tentative inch from McKay's shoulder. "She will only keep asking. Rodney, please--"

"Get out before I throw you out." McKay's voice is thick, and he does not turn around. Ronon's stomach roils. Zelenka turns blindly away, shouldering past him in the doorway, face wet. The tang of salt settles heavily on Ronon's tongue.

McKay braces his hands on the counter, defeated, broad shoulders hunched. "Ronon," he says, voice rough, exhausted. "What do you want."

Ronon takes one step forward, feeling glass crunch under his boots. The air stinks of coffee, of grief. "Stomach tablets," he says. "Too much lasagna last night."

McKay snorts, obscenely normal. The sound grates in Ronon's ears. "Right. Well." He rifles through his pockets, removes several small bottles. He doesn't touch Ronon when he hands them over.

Ronon starts to turn away. "Wait," says McKay. He holds out a powerbar. "Peanut butter. You like those, right? Take it." He opens a drawer and pulls out four more. "Take all of them."

Ronon's chest starts to burn along with his stomach. "You don't want them?" he asks, remembering shared meals on a hundred strange worlds.

McKay averts his eyes, presses the powerbars into Ronon's hand. "I won't--I'm not hungry."

Ronon returns to his room in silence. Two hours later, when he hears the distinctive crackling _boom_ of a jumper exploding overhead and the frantic, dismayed burst of chatter over the comm system, he thinks of last rites, and chokes back peanut butter and bile.

 

*****************************************  
Ronon wakes to the deep, heavy ache of arousal, the thrum of blood in his groin. He works his hands under the blanket to curl gently around his sac and strokes himself firmly, once, twice. He has time. Who would interupt him? He's the only one of his team left.

He works himself slowly, eyes closed, mind blank like clean snow. His orgasm feels inevitable in its onslaught, and leaves him cold inside. His extremities tingle, like frostnip.

Afterward, he stares at the bare walls of his quarters and remembers the feel of soft loam under his feet, the way his whole body would throb in rhythm with his stride, the way the ground would rise to meet him.

He dresses, splashes water on his face, and steps out into the empty, echoing hallway. He moves slowly at first, feeling his muscles loosen, then gradually increases his pace until he's running, easy and purposeful. Shock waves shiver through his body with each strike of his heel, and he waits for the wash of heat, the slow bloom of warmth suffusing his muscles. It doesn't come. He runs on, curiously chilled.

Weir stops him just outside the mess. "Ronon," she says, hand firm on his forearm. "Do you have a moment? I need to speak with you."

His body thrums with energy, with the need to move, but he swallows his impatience and nods silently, follows her to a table against the far wall of the mess. It's an off hour and the room is deserted, though Ronon scents the richness of roasting meat in the warm, humid air. Weir sits and draws him down next to her. He goes unwillingly, feeling himself vibrate with restless energy, but her hand is damp and warm, so warm against his skin.

"It's about your reassignment," says Weir. Her body bends toward his, open and relaxed, but her eyes are guarded. "Major Lorne has agreed to take you on as part of his team, now that--" she falters, lips shaping around a name, or perhaps several. Ronon's teeth clench, but he makes no move, although a faint shiver runs down his spine. Weir recovers and continues, voice steady once again. "However, I would prefer for the moment that you not participate in away missions, but instead remain here in Atlantis. You know as well as I that there have been recent--security concerns."

"Concerns," Ronon says, voice flat. He thinks of Teyla, lost through the stargate, her desire for her people's survival the heaviest weight on her back. He presses his arms tightly to his body for warmth.

"Of course you wouldn't be grounded indefinitely," says Weir, leaning closer in an attempt at reassurance. Ronon shudders in disgust. She looked at the members of his team and did not see what mattered most, and so asked them for what they could not give. He will not be placated. "You must understand, though, that in a wartime situation, loyalty is of the utmost importance."

The coldness in Ronon's belly intensifies. "Loyalty," he grits out, remembering Sheppard's anguished face in a dark, deadened room, the way McKay's eyes would shine when he spoke of his legacy of knowledge. He remembers Weir's name on their lips before they turned away to their deaths. "You want to know mine."

Heat billows off Weir as she nods, eyes sharp. "We simply need to be sure."

When he pins her head to the table with a hand at her throat, heat roars through him at last. "What do you pledge yourself to?" Ronon demands, thrusting into her as fire races up his spine, seeing red. "Tell me. Name _your_ allegiance."

When she says nothing, he makes her bleed instead. Her blood is warm.

 

*********************************  
When Ronon steps through the Atlantis stargate for the last time, he feels his entire body wake. He stretches, watchful, mind subsumed by the need to move, to run, to be at home in his own skin, alive.

The stars shine above him, brilliant and cold.

END.


End file.
